What would the Left call the Right, if the small boat people were white?

[Blondiebeachbabe]

I'll start by saying, I am very anti open boarders, and I am horrified that so many illegal immigrants are arriving every day. But for me, it has absolutely nothing to do with skin colour, it is more to do with :

ONE) They have no documentation, and we have no idea if they have criminal backgrounds

TWO) They tend to come from cultures where women are not respected

THREE) They often come from places where rape is not a crime

FOUR) They cannot work, and it is costing Millions to house, feed and clothe them

FIVE) We are granting asylum to some people who should never get it - like the Hamas bodyguard we heard of yesterday

Lots of valid reasons I feel, however, for me, it has nothing to do with skin colour. If I had to be locked in a room overnight with a white man from a backward culture, or a black man from the UK, I would choose the latter, every single time.

It isn't colour, it's culture

But I see that people on the Far Left just scream "Racist" to anyone who opposes illegal immigration. What would they scream, if all the small boats were full of white men? And would people still march for England?

I’m quoting your own use of it, so answer your own question.

I'm happy with that.

I was quoting someone else miles up thread who was talking about why people from Hong Kong are ok while other refugees aren’t. In that context yes I deny any culture is more ‘civilised’ than any other. We’re all human. I’d hoped we’d have moved on from the idea of ‘civilised’ vs ‘uncivilised’ peoples by now.

You think that the culture in Hong Kong is neither better nor worse than any other culture on the face of the planet?

You’ve completely lost the plot. When Reform come to power, you won’t even have a clue that it was attitudes like yours which took them there.

You can hope for that all you like. But you'd have to successfully argue that people belonging to uncontacted tribes of the Amazon Rainforest, for example, are as civilised as the rest of us in the developed world by default of them belonging to the same species as us before your hopes and dreams come true. But you can't, so they won't.

Who decides what is ‘better’? Plenty of people on the planet think European culture is less ‘civilised’ than their own. Who judges who is right? I have my culture but it doesn’t entirely define me as a person and my values. I like to learn about other cultures, some things I like about them some things I don’t but experience has taught me it’s always more nuanced than ‘unquestionably good’ and ‘unquestionably bad’. And that all people are more than just some overarching ‘culture’. Most places these days are multicultural anyway and almost everyone is exposed to some level of globalised influence.

also, a lot of people seem to forget that political regime, while influencing and being influenced by it, is not the same as culture.

Again, how are you defining civilised here?

So would you be ok with your daughter backpacking through Iraq or Afghanistan and worry as much if she was doing it in Scotland or Norway?

"Civilised is an adjective that describes an advanced society with developed social systems and government, or a person who is polite, cultured, and reasonable"

What a lot of straw men. Nobody is saying that one culture is unquestionably good and another is unquestionably bad. We are saying that one is better than another in ways that are important. And to answer your question directly about who gets to decide: we, the voting public do. Hence the rise of Reform. We live in a democracy. The sneering classes seem to have forgotten this.

You were happy to use the word yourself but now you demand a perfect definition. You’re not fooling anybody.

None of them actually believe the nonsense they spout. None of them would actually vote with their feet.

and what makes a society ‘advanced’? I’d imagine uncontacted groups have pretty developed social systems, if only because it takes a pretty high level of community organisation to remain uncontacted in the 21st century! But of course, since they’re uncontacted we can’t know, or about their politeness…

Neither Iraq or Afghanistan is safe for anyone, hence why people need to leave and come somewhere safe. If Scotland was taken over by the Taliban I would hope Scottish men were not assumed to share the values of the Taliban.

They live in a place that is virtually inaccessible, save for impoverished people who are prepared to venture there to cultivate drugs or chop trees down. Encounters with these people very often end in death, even if you give them many peace offerings. So lets say your job is to go into the rainforest and cut trees down. You encounter an uncontacted tribe, you give them everything you have and you show them by all means possible that you mean them no harm. They take everything you offer and then kill every member of your group that they're able to hit with their sharpened bamboo spears. And they're naked and mimicking animal sounds as they do all of this. If you say you'd still consider them civilised, I'd suggest that you're talking absolute horseshit to try to win an argument on Mumsnet.

My point is that civilised is not a useful term because it just means ‘not as good as us’. I don’t think it has any place in any debate in 2026.

your somewhat ironic example proves my point tbh.

Where is the irony and how does it prove your point? I fear we're about to have an argument about the definition of "irony", tbh.

Wow! Let’s say the taliban are no longer in control. What about Somalia or Egypt?

Why is the truth a 'racist dog whistle' ?

Germany are deporting people back to Afghanistan

https://www.afintl.com/en/202608257736

well I may be doing an Alanis Morrisette here but regardless, your example of ‘uncivilised’ is people dressed in an unfamiliar and intimidating manner trying to violently prevent outsiders coming into their territory to use their resources. Which is interesting/confusing, in the context of this thread.

You keep asking what civilised means but when I give you a concrete example like how a society treats women and LGBT people, you never respond.

This always gets skipped.

Or they say “Oh but it’s more dangerous there because of how we in the West have treated them”.

And yet Japan lost a world war and became a thriving economy.

I can't speak for other posters, but I wouldn't want my son or my daughter backpacking through Afghanistan or Iraq.

There's poor communication, healthcare, travel connections, not to mention that Afghanistan is an actual war zone and Iraq is hardly stable and conflict-free.

I'm not sure why this comes up as an argument against refugees and asylum seekers. No I bloody wouldn't want my children in a war zone so I can completely understand why the poor buggers that live there want to leave!